5 month old nap issues

[Naube]

Good Afternoon All,

This is the first time I've posted on here.  But I am a bit confused. I have a lite girl that is just about 5 months old.  She has always fought sleep but I think that's because she's overtired by the time we try to get her to bed.  So,  this week we are trying new things.  So I know at her age she should be sleeping 15.5 hours a day with 3 naps.  My issue is she sleeps 12.5 hours straight through at night so is it really that strange if she only takes 45-1 hour naps?   Also,  I'm trying to eliminate the nursing to sleep for nap time I know she doesn't need it,  so anyone have some good nap time routines?

Thanks!

[lauradj]

Hi there, have you read Tracy's books?  I ask because Tracy strongly discourages feeding to sleep as it hinders the development of independent sleep.  At 5 months your little one should be able to be awake for somewhere between a 1.5-2hrs, every baby is different.  There is a period between about 2-4months where naps are short no matter what you do but most babies start to come out of it by about 4.5 months.  Check out the Activity Forum under EASY routines for some suggestions.

[weaver]

Hello and welcome to BW!
If she fights every nap and never sleeps more than 45minutes to an hour, there is a chance that she is undertired, rather than overtired.  Laura is correct to say that lots of LOs have short naps between 3-6 mos, but they are usually 30-45 mins.  45 and up is generally undertired.

At five months, average A time is 2 hrs - 2hrs 30 mins, and going towards 3 hours as they get towards 6 months.  The general structure of sleep is something like 2 1.5-2 hr naps, 1 45 min catnap, and 10-12 hours at night.  Sounds like she does great nights!

Here are some excellent tips for wind-down before naps. You don't have to do all of this, feel free to adapt to whatever you and your LO like, as long as you are consistent, she will learn that these things mean it's sleep time.  It is a good idea to get her out of the habit of feeding to sleep at this younger age.  It can be pretty tough to do when they are older!
What does a good wind down consist of (Includes 4S ritual)

And here are some sample EASYs for her age group, they're on the EASY Forum, under 'Activity'.
Sample EASY Routines from 0 - 13mths+

HTH.

[Naube]

I know that nursing to sleep is a terrible thing. I have been trying the shh-pat for a few days now.  My daughter is slowly adjusting.   She use to get incredibly worked up every time we go to her room and close the blinds.  So, nursing was just an easy way to calm her down and now it's become a bad routine. 

Yes I have read two of the books. Trying to get into easy now.  But maybe I had prego brain, don't remember reading about short naps for a few months. 

Thanks for the help.

[lauradj]

Feeding to sleep isn't terrible, it just means it takes a bit longer to teach your LO independent sleep.  When my DS was little I used to feed him to sleep at bedtime every night.  I just loved the milk drunk face/body!  Too cute 
I don't actually remember if Tracy mentions the brief naps between 3-5 months but I know a lot of moms on here have mentioned it enough times that it's taken for granted that most babies go through that phase.

[Naube]

Think we stopped the nursing to sleep, it's been great there's definitely less stress getting my lo to sleep now.  But,mshe stopped sleeping the 12 hours through the night : (. Might try the dream feed if she doesn't adjust back to her prior schedule.  Now we are just working on getting her to fall asleep on her own and shorten her wind down period before sleep.  I found that if I gave her a longer wind down period I don't usually get screaming or much crying when I lay her down and only have to do shh pat for a few minutes. M

[weaver]

Great that the longer wind-down is working for you

If you're not feeding to sleep anymore, then, yes, I suppose her milk consumption will have gone down and she might be waking up hungry.  So you might want to think about your feeding routine.  Both my LOs held on to the DF til around 10 mos.  Remember, as well, that BF babies can go from no NFs to two during the night and back to none, depending on where they are with growth spurts and that sort of thing.  Any concerns about feeding, pop over to the breastfeeding board.
Breast Feeding